Warner Robins teen jumps for silver at national competition

When Nadia Rosenbaum started participating in horse shows, she was competitive.

In one of the beginning divisions, she was telling her competitors she was going to beat them.

“She has that killer instinct,” said her mother, Lola Rosenbaum.

This year, she has fulfilled one of her lifetime goals by going to the United States Equestrian Federation Pony Finals in Lexington, Kentucky.

Leasing a brown and white paint pony named Broadway’s Puzzle Piece, Nadia and her Zone 4 team won silver at the national event.

The top five riders from each of the 12 zones in the U.S. compete for the team championship.

Zone 4 consists of riders from the Southeast.

The goal of the jumpers is to ride a course of jumps and not knock any rails on the fences down. Each rail knocked down is considered four faults. The Zone 4 team finished with 32 faults while the winning team had 20.

The jumps are 1.10 meters high.

“It’s an adrenaline rush,” 17-year-old Nadia Rosenbaum said at her home in Warner Robins on Friday, where she has piles of ribbons and trophies she has won since she was in grade school.

She has won numerous local championships as well as rated competitions in Georgia and surrounding states. This was her first year competing in the jumper division.

In May, she competed with Puzzle at the Devon Horse Show and received an eighth-place ribbon.

Devon, located in Pennsylvania, is also an event that a rider has to qualify for to be able to compete in it.

While in Pennsylvania, Nadia and Puzzle raised money for the Center for Autism. The symbol for autism is a puzzle piece and Nadia thought it fitting for her aptly named pony to be able to give back to those who need help. The pair raised more than $3,000.

“We had a lot of people help. Westfield School [in Perry] had a T-shirt day for $1,” Lola Rosenbaum said.

The teen has had many trainers over the years, but she trained with Puzzle at Fox Hollow Farm in Kathleen with Barbara Fritz. It is also where she boarded her horse Gimme, who was leased to another girl at the farm.

One of the most special moments for both mother and daughter at pony finals was watching Nadia’s horse Gimme competing with rider Claire Lee.

This year, however, she plans to shift her focus away from horses so that she can concentrate on playing tennis for her school.

Nadia is a senior at Westfield and plans to attend Augusta University next fall. She plans to continue riding.

“There’s always going to be a place for me in riding,” she said.

This story was originally published August 28, 2016 at 2:57 PM with the headline "Warner Robins teen jumps for silver at national competition."